I am so affluent that I could...but I don't. If I did consume that much food (calories) I would have to burn that many calories (give or take a metabolic variable*) to keep from putting on weight. In view of this country's obesity epidemic I can assume that we as a society are so affluent that we can afford to consume many more calories than we burn.The BMI calculator at

said that my 221 lbs on my 6'0" body = 30 = Obese. That was just before Thanksgiving, 2007.

Now, before I go any further this is not about a diet and how much weight I may or may not have lost. There are plenty of blog posts that extol the merits of every diet imaginable, somewhere else.

The insights that I want to share in this post are 'side effects' - lessons that I have learned along the way. Before elaborating I feel obliged to assert the following: YMMV - please consult a physician.

I limit my caloric intake to 1500-1750 calories per day. I can eat anything, anything I want. I just cannot eat as much as I might want.

You use energy no matter what you're doing, even when sleeping. The BMR Calculator will calculate your Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR); the number of calories you'd burn if you stayed in bed all day.

You have a BMR of 1939.95.

I take this to mean that if I consume 1500-1750 calories a day and burn 1939.95 then I am likely to lose weight. Additionally, since I get up and go to work most days I am likely to burn significantly more than just my 'BMR'. (Spoiler: It is working.)

When I started eating 1500-1750 calories per day - my chronic heartburn went away. I went from taking a maximum strength 'Acid Suppressor' and 4-6 antacids per day to zero, nada, none. This is a MAJOR achievement for me as I don't like taking as much as an aspirin - even if I do have a splitting headache.

I became reacquainted with fresh green vegetables and fresh fruits. To put the most delicate spin on the matter this had a cleansing affect on my alimentary system.

Once my internal plumbing system was cleaned out I quickly realized how BLOATED and uncomfortable I get when I do "enjoy" one of those caloric-expensive double McCheeseburgers.

Initially I was HUNGRY all the time. This was/is very frustrating. I am an affluent American, born to the land of plenty - Why, oh why must I feel hungry for even one minute?!? Why (whine) must I endure such 'agony' ... "I'm whiney hungry. I deserve to eat anything I want. I demand the right to satisfy my desires. I should get anything I whiney want!"

By paying attention and eating small amounts of good food to alleviate my desires I can manage my hunger. In fact, once I begin to understand the difference between my desires and what real hunger is... I have realized that I am not really hungry all the time...like I thought I felt.

Society, most specifically the media and its supporters in conjunction with the major food producers, contribute more than any other to America's problem of obesity. Sadly it is a simple matter of supply-and-demand profit driven economics. Put in its simplest terms... FAT is cheap. If I sell you FAT then I make more money. If I convince you that FAT tastes better than lean you will buy more FAT...and I will make more money. The more FAT you buy the FATTER you become. Ironically, our obesity is a direct result of our capitalism flourishing.

Which brings me to the real... economy of nutrition. This is the real lesson in all of this. It is true, I can eat anything I want. So I can eat one double McCheeseburger _or_ I can have 2 HUGE salads. The McCheeseburger leaves me feeling bloated and uncomfortable and HUNGRY 2 hours later ... 2 HUGE salads will satisfy my hunger for the entire day AND allow me to snack on healthy food throughout the day. By being nutritionally selective I get the benefit of food value and the volume that satisfies my socially driven desires.

(You see? I haven't just been obsessing about the Democratic primaries... I really do have a few other concerns in my life. :)

Sen. Clinton accepts donations from troubled firm

Sen. Hillary Clinton has declined to return $170,000 in campaign contributions from individuals at a company accused of widespread sexual harassment, and whose CEO is a disbarred lawyer with a criminal record, federal campaign records show.

The federal government has accused the Illinois management consulting firm, International Profit Associates, or IPA, of a brazen pattern of sexual harassment including "sexual assaults,” “degrading anti-female language" and "obscene suggestions."

...The most significant element of the coverage that has so rankled the Clinton campaign may be one that cannot responsibly be omitted: her recent win-loss record in nominating contests.

“My role model and mentor at The A.P. was Walter Mears, who recently retired, and he used to say that who wins is part of the story,” said Mike Glover, an Associated Press reporter, as he flew on Mrs. Clinton’s plane on Thursday from Hanging Rock, Ohio, to Houston. “We’re covering a candidate who’s lost 11 straight primaries. They’re covering a candidate who has won 11 straight primaries.”

Friday, February 29, 2008

“Now one of Clinton’s laws of politics is this: If one candidate’s trying to scare you and the other one’s trying to get you to think, if one candidate’s appealing to your fears and the other one’s appealing to your hopes, you better vote for the person who wants you to think and hope.”

Using NGOs to Push Agendas

The extent to which Microsoft can go in its efforts to get OOXML is interesting. Microsoft has "persuaded" several non-profit organizations to bombard the Indian IT Secretary and the Additional Director General of the Bureau of Indian Standards with letters supporting its OOXML proposal. A copy of the form letter they have been circulating to NGOs is given below. Somebody should interview these NGOs to see how much they really know about OOXML and open standards.

Letter from an NGO thanking Microsoft (name changed to protect their identity)

I'd like to thank you personally, and on behalf of XYZ, for Microsoft's invaluable contribution to the cause of XYZ in India. The grant will go a long way in enabling XYZ to enhance our productivity, efficiency and impact. Apart, of course, from permitting us to deploy the money saved to programmes. I do hope you can find the time soon to visit a XYZ-supported project to see your contribution in action.

Mail from Microsoft India's Corporate Social Responsibility group to the NGO

As per our discussion please find attached the draft letters -­ please cut/edit/ delete and change it any which way you find useful. Also attached is the list of NGOs who have sent the letters. And attached is also a document that details wht (sic) this debate is all about. Look forward to hear from you in this regard. In case you decide to send the letters, can you please send me a scan of the singed (sic) letters that you send out. Thanks this will help me track the process.

Thanks

Form letters on OOXML sent by Microsoft to NGOs

Please paraphrase "We support OXML as a standard that encourages multiplicity of choice and interoperability giving us the ultimate consumer the choice. * recognizes that multiple standards are good for the economy and also for technical innovation and progress in the country, especially for smaller organizations like us, who require choice and innovation"

Please write about your work

Please paraphrase "*** also supports OXML as this does not have any financial implications thus releasing our resources for welfare and development of society."

Please paraphrase "We support OXML as a standard that encourages multiplicity of choice and interoperability giving us the ultimate consumer the choice. * recognizes that multiple standards are good for the economy and also for technical innovation and progress in the country, especially for smaller organizations like us, who require choice and innovation"

Please write about your work

Please paraphrase "*** also supports OXML as this does not have any financial implications thus releasing our resources for welfare and development of society."

Thanking You

Yours Faithfully

Name Designation

So some, if not all of these NGOs are beneficiaries of cash inputs from MS' Corporate Social Railroading^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H Responsibility arm. I'd really be interested in answers to these questions, anyone up to asking them?

How many letters supporting OOXML has the Government of India received from NGOs in the recent past?

How many of these NGOs have received cash inputs (directly or indirectly) from MS?

How many of these NGOs can sit across a table and discuss OOXML?

How many of these NGOs can enumerate the benefits of OOXML over, say, ODF for their own organisations?

Thursday, February 28, 2008

Voters in places like Atlanta, Brooklyn, St. Louis, and Inglewood have made clear their choice for president: Barack Obama. So why are some members of the Congressional Black Caucus threatening to use their power as "superdelegates" to undermine those votes and nominate Hillary Clinton?

Voters should decide elections--not politicians. And members of the Congressional Black Caucus should amplify the political voice of their constituents, not silence it. I've joined ColorOfChange.org in demanding that the CBC to listen to the voters; let's tell them to vote with the people, not against us:

Voters in almost all the districts represented by the CBC have chosen Obama, helping him win more delegates than Clinton. But only some delegates vote based on the results of primaries. A fifth of the delegates that will vote at the convention -- and decide the nomination -- are "superdelegates" that can technically vote however they like, regardless of what the voters say. These superdelegates are members of Congress, senators, governors and Democratic party insiders. In a contest this close, they have the power to overturn the will of voters, and decide the outcome.

In 2000 and 2004, CBC members stood up to defend the rights of Black voters that had been disenfranchised. It would be a disgrace for its members to now undermine the votes of Black people in their districts. Rarely have Black voters across the country been so unified behind a particular candidate; if CBC members vote against their constituents, it will diminish the power of Black voters in a historic election that could result in our country's first Black president.

It will take courage and conviction for CBC members to break with back-room politics and stand up for democracy. But we must demand it. Please join us:

Under the thin guise of an 'informative' site the Clinton's campaign is trying to usurp the popular vote by swaying super delegates to vote for "the candidate they believe is best qualified to be president."

I urge everyone to review "Delegate Hub" ( Paid for by Hillary Clinton for President ) and see for yourself what a desperate ploy this is to undermine the democratic process.

Which brings us to Senator Clinton. Faced with fears that she may be planning to ignore our votes, she has gone public with what we might call the Washington defense: "Of course I'm planning to ignore you if you don't vote for me, because I want to win. That's how it works. If I get elected by seating the bogus Florida and Michigan delegates, and convincing party members to vote for me no matter what you want, well, what's the big deal? As long as the process selects a candidate, what does it matter if it isn't the one most of you want?"

(Now forming...the committee to not re-elect Presidents Clinton)I am William "Papa" Meloney and I endorse this message.

And there was the shift in thinking that came from last night's debate. We already have more leadership from this man who hasn't even won the Democratic nomination yet than we have from the actual President of the United States. Further, in the last two campaigns, I have exhorted the candidates to use the money they raise to solve important problems, and realize that Obama had done exactly that. He's uniting us as a country. There's nothing more important, once we remember that we're all Americans and that that means something, we can do so much more than when we're divided by the "wedge issues" of cynical political hacks. We always have had the option to take back our country, now we seem to be doing that.

When we put aside our differences, and I'm not talking about the heads of companies and lobbyists and government officials, but the people, they really can't stop us. We have the means to pass laws that they have to obey and we have police and military to enforce those laws. The founders of our country believed in this, and believed in us, we're not fools to agree with them, we're just using our power.

Wednesday, February 27, 2008

Barack Obama is being lambasted in political circles for not condemning Louis Farrakhan. In Tuesday's "Debate" (citing the NYT transcript)

MR. RUSSERT: Senator Obama, one of the things in a campaign is that you have to react to unexpected developments.

On Sunday, the headline in your hometown paper, Chicago Tribune: "Louis Farrakhan Backs Obama for President at Nation of Islam Convention in Chicago." Do you accept the support of Louis Farrakhan?

SEN. OBAMA: You know, I have been very clear in my denunciation of Minister Farrakhan's anti-Semitic comments. I think that they are unacceptable and reprehensible. I did not solicit this support. He expressed pride in an African-American who seems to be bringing the country together. I obviously can't censor him, but it is not support that I sought. And we're not doing anything, I assure you, formally or informally with Minister Farrakhan.

MR. RUSSERT: Do you reject his support?

SEN. OBAMA: Well, Tim, you know, I can't say to somebody that he can't say that he thinks I'm a good guy. (Laughter.) You know, I -- you know, I -- I have been very clear in my denunciations of him and his past statements, and I think that indicates to the American people what my stance is on those comments.

Emphasis mine for clarity of focus...

Translation: Senator Obama have you stopped associating with anti-semites?

(To understand this translation see my previous post: Open Truth)Now, listen to the Truth of his answer ... I obviously can't censor him, but it is not support that I sought. Senator Obama is honoring the First Amendment rights of Louis Farrakhan and the "American Political Experience" (A.P.E.) culture is trying to bludgeon him with it. These are the same First Amendment rights that we insists are our unalienable rights.

"Well, Tim, you know, I can't say to somebody that he can't say that he thinks I'm a good guy."

Who Will Tell Hillary?

Clinton's tipping point may have come when it was announced that her $5 million loan to her campaign came from a fund she shares with Bill Clinton. That puts into play for the general election business deals by the former president that transformed him from an indigent to a multimillionaire and might excite interest in their income tax returns, which the Clintons refuse to release. The prospect impels many Democratic insiders to pray for the clear Obama victories on March 4 that they hope will make it unnecessary for anybody to beg Hillary Clinton to end her failed campaign.

(Now forming...the committee to not re-elect Presidents Clinton)I am William "Papa" Meloney and I endorse this message.

Each is designed to elicit a truthful response and at the same time condemn the responder. The particular 'feature' of these questions is that we as a culture use them to condemn the responder regardless of the truth of their answer.

Michelle Obama has had the unfortunate "American Political Experience" of having told the truth. She told the American public "... recently that she's really proud of her country for the first time in her adult life." (AP) Within seconds of that utterance political adversaries and pundits speculated that Michelle had not been proud of her country. (They even went to sanctimonious ends to suggest that they have always been proud of their country.)

Let me state this as clearly as I possibly can.

On occasions too numerous to mention I have not been proud of my country. - William B. Meloney VII

Michelle Obama has fearlessly told the truth and we as an "A.P.E." culture have tried to bludgeon her with it. Shame on us!

Michelle Obama should be revered for stating clearly that 'the emperor is naked!' For the first time in many of our adult lives we truly have something of which we can be proud. For the first time in my adult life I am not subject to "politics as usual." In this political race there is a possibility that the election will not be stolen from the candidate with the populous mandate. For the first time in my adult life I feel that personal views are not only being heard but honored.